I don't get it!


I like older movies and I'm not a dumb action movie guy, but I really don't get why this movie is so revered. Its over 2 hours of drinking, screaming and over the top acting about there sad and depressing lives. I could barely sit thru it. I think Richard Burton was a standout in this movie and probably deserved the oscar, but I have never liked Liz Taylor in anything and I think she is the most overrated actress in history.

I think the 60's was an awkward decade for hollywood anyway. With the golden age of big studios and legendary actors fading away and the crumbling of censorship there was a transition period as to which direction to go. There was also the strong influence of more arty and raw independent/foreign movies that was tugging at them as well, and for me it wasn't until the early 70's until it all came together. The 40's and 70's were the best decades for Hollywood. What do you think?

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I'm with you. I watched it last night and kept waiting for it to get good since it is rated so highly but it never did (and I am female). You hit it right on the head - a movie of drinking, screaming, and hurting others. Maybe I am just not intellectual enough to understand the movie.

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I'm glad somebody agrees with me. I figured i would get killed on this board.

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[deleted]

No killing necessary :) but many of us do get it and like it, to each their own :)

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Wow, I am amazed. Tonight for about the fourth or fifth time in my life, I tried to get into this movie because I thought I should. I just can't stand the ugliness, though and, as I have in the past, turned it off 15 or 20 minutes in. I have nothing against Liz Taylor or Richard Burton and like them in other movies.

I thought to myself, dare I say this on the board?

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I could and should have replied to the post above of yours but I chose to address your post because you are a female.
All said and done and at the end of the day if one wish to really understand this film, one must accept that essentially this film is about a universal human pain named childlessness.
No other term of reference will provide better leverage to understand 'Who's afraid of Virginia wolf', in my humble opinion.
This film has a radical effect on my mind in a way that after watching it my attitude towards childless couples have changed to pure compassion. I might be sounding like an emotional fool but this is exactly what this movie means to me and i will also add that this is one of the best films i have ever watched.

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Aside from wanting a LOT of Bourbon after watching this film, it really hit me in the relationship department, how simple, stupid disagreements and lots of other neuroses can combine to create a Perfect Emotional Storm! I've been through it and while some people, depending on their natures, are able to weather such things with minimal damage, others who are touchier, angrier, less self-assured (like George) allow it to proceed, unchecked, into Armageddon!

You can NOT understand a film like this, I truly believe, unless you've been IN such a dysfunctional relationship, even if it only remotely resembles the catastrophe of George and Martha's relationship.

But these kinds of marriages do exist and that was what what we got to witness, for better or worse.

I just want to add that it was a brilliant, savage telling of a marriage scarred by tragedy, and that the duo of Burton and Taylor was never better. Mike Nichols, frightened as he was of his first outing as film dir., came up as an amazing find!


She deserves her revenge, and we deserve to die.

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Agree with rasheed, i watched it last night and yes its a good film,i enjoyed it.
All actors shined in this film,i originally thought honey the blond wife wasn't going to add much to the dialogue but as the film progressed i said to myself she's playing her part expertly and thought she was a fine actress,though iv'e never heard of her before.
After then reading the back of the film case i note she won best supporting actress.
So i wasn't surprised.
At the end of the film i came to my own conclussion about the matter of the son/child.
That it was a fictional character made up by the couple to give them something (a story to tell)and that the other couple had a similar childlessness story.
Yes its not a action film but a drama of the highest calibre executed by 4 great actors.
One for a intelligent audience that doesn't want to see make believe computer generated films all the time.
p.s on another note re elizabeth taylor ..i too wasn't keen on her later years but think she gave as good a performance in this film as any actress in any other films.I also liked her in her early career in the little women.So i now have a higher opinion of her as a actress.As for richard burton..he's always been top drawer.

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One reason why some people won't like it (besides the subject matter) is that this is a filmed play & therefore more literary than cinematic.

The 60s (US & UK) was really the decade of the filmed play, a switch from the musicals of the 40s & 50s:

Romeo & Juliet
Look Back In Anger
Who's Afraid Of Virgina Wolf
Beckett
The Balcony
A Man For All Seasons
Alfie
The Children's Hour
The Chase
Toys In The Attic
The Fugitive Kind
Night Of The Iguana
Long Day's Journey Into Night
The Iceman Cometh
The Trials Of Oscar Wilde
A Taste Of Honey
A Raisin In The Sun
The Odd Couple
Barefoot In The Park
The Miracle Worker

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ChrisWN^

Wow! Great list!

And, not many people know 'Toys In The Attic' :)

That movie and some of the other ones you listed, including 'Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf', are movies I consider to be very good but can be uncomfortable to watch.


cheers, denise1234 :)





"I can't stand a naked light bulb, any more than..a rude remark or a vulgar action" Blanche DuBois

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That is a really good point. Movie audiences in the 60's would have known what to expect when going to see 'Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf'.

"What do you want me to do, draw a picture? Spell it out!"

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None of the filmes you listed above is a filmed play. They are all film-versions of (great) plays. All of them are very cinematic, specially The Night of the Iguana, Alfie, The Chase ...even "Beckett." A filmed play is something else. Othello (1965) with Laurence Olivier, is a filmed play. They're hard to swallow.

Who's Afraid of Virginia Wolf? has lots of camera angles, close-ups, camera movements...the director did not have to open-up the play to make it cinematic. The camerawork did the trick. "La planificación".

I saw it for the first time when I was about 15 years old and did not understand the purpose of the movie. My uncle told me: "It's about a middle-age marriage", but I knew that there was more, much more to it than that! It's about the oppressive nature of life and our need to escape from it through fantasy, and the traps that come with this solution. (Esto me habría quedado más bonito si mi inglés fuera mejor).

By the way, Burton's pronnunciation of the Spanish words: "Flores para los muertos, flores, flores, flores..." is perfect. He's latin is also pretty good. Great actor. When I found out that Arthur Hiller had donde the play on Broadway, I immediately understood the character better. Burton is too big for the part (too much personality). Peter O'Toole would have been a better choice. The same thing happened to me with Rex Harrison in My Fair Lady. I understood the character when I saw the version with Leslie Howard.

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I think that's what he meant by "filmed play"; he just phrased it differently. "Adaptation" would have been better. I agree that in that list, they are all quite cinematic. And yes, films like Olivier's "Othello" and "Hamlet" are hard to take! I dislike most theater anyway, so I'm very grateful to film directors who adapt great stories from the stage.

You may be right about Burton being "too big", since George is more vicious and wimpy, but who else could hold their own against Elizabeth Taylor? Peter O'Toole barely held his own against the formidable Katherine Hepburn during another family take-down, "The Lion in Winter". I think the only reason was that, unlike Martha, Elianor of Aquitaine (as portrayed in the film) was more cultured and refined. I think she and Martha would have gotten along great!


She deserves her revenge, and we deserve to die.

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Peter O'Toole barely held his own against the formidable Katherine Hepburn during another family take-down, "The Lion in Winter".

Blasphemy. Peter O'Toole rocked it in The Lion in Winter.






My Vote history: http://www.imdb.com/user/ur1914996/ratings

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Blasphemy. Peter O'Toole rocked it in The Lion in Winter.


I agree, and I would probably have seen him in a better light if (in my opinion) Hepburn was not such a force of nature! My view was colored by two things, I think:

1. O'Toole has a much more "theatrical" style than Hepburn, which is fine, especially in the theatre. But on film, it can be a bit much. For me, Hepburn, much more oriented to film, just "owns" this film. If I had to say who came up second, it would be Anthony Hopkins; he was able to convey a similar range of emotions as O'Toole did, but more subtly.

2. I don't know if this was planned, but the two actors aptly represented the accounts of both Henry's and Eleanor's different personalities. Henry (as was Richard, later), was known for his outrageous temper and mood swings. He was larger than life, which O'Toole portrayed very well(for the second time!).

Eleanor was far more cultivated and subtle, though no less power-hungry or ruthless! She had that courtly love ideal going and a measure of polish that Henry lacked. Thus, Hepburn was perfect in that sort of role. She doesn't fly off the handle at every turn, as Henry/O'Toole does, but holds it in regally and then turns on her attackers like a wolverine, once cornered. Her "style" is much different than O'Toole's raving, bull-in-a-china-shop reaction to most conflict. This contrast worked fantastically, I thought.

They're BOTH great--just different, and I prefer Hepburn's acting style. I will almost always prefer an actor who is more film-based than theatre-trained. Just a preference.



Nothing is what it seems. Everything is a test. Rule #1: Don't...get...caught.

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1. O'Toole has a much more "theatrical" style than Hepburn, which is fine, especially in the theatre. But on film, it can be a bit much. For me, Hepburn, much more oriented to film, just "owns" this film. If I had to say who came up second, it would be Anthony Hopkins; he was able to convey a similar range of emotions as O'Toole did, but more subtly.


I agree but in that film it worked. I always describe The Lion In Winter as a modern day Shakespeare play. Excellently written quips and although O'Toole does seem a bit over the top at times, I always chalked it up to the character's personality. Kings are quite often displayed as a boisterous and loud bunch while Queens are more "subtle" as you say. However I agree that you could be quite right. O'Toole is from the theater and has been accused of being too theatrical in other works but I feel in this film which is a theater production and displaying a King I felt it worked quite well.

2. I don't know if this was planned, but the two actors aptly represented the accounts of both Henry's and Eleanor's different personalities. Henry (as was Richard, later), was known for his outrageous temper and mood swings. He was larger than life, which O'Toole portrayed very well(for the second time!).

Curiously enough in other representations of Eleanor of Aquitaine she is never characterized as being quite as melodramatic, clever, and cunning as in The Lion In Winter. I mean Hepburn's performance combined with the writing you really, really fall in love with her and grow to feel for the character. I will say that no one has carried the character quite as good as Hepburn.

The Lion In Winter is one of my favorite films and I am glad to see others have the same appreciation for it as I.








My Vote history: http://www.imdb.com/user/ur1914996/ratings

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I'm SO glad that we agree on most aspects of these two theatre/cinema greats! I still remember the effect that the opening credits had on me...those gargoyles and dark, medieval corridors, with the hyped-up Gregorian chants! It was chilling. You knew you were in for a sleigh ride!

As you said, Hepburn may have been as over the top vis. Eleanor as O'Toole is regarding Henry II. I suspect we imbue them with our own cinematic version of what the SCTV bunch mockingly call 'Popes and Kings"! (ever see that?...it's hysterical!).

But still, The Lion in Winter had much the same effect on me as Zeffirelli's "Romeo and Juliet" did a few years later. I just seemed so REAL!

Regarding Eleanor's cunning, etc., I did a LOT of research on her and Richard, since my grandmother's family name was "Langevin" and my dad (an amateur genealogist) had traced them to Canada. It appears that indeed, she was as tough and resilient, if not more so, than the film shows her to be! She survived, not only Henry II, but almost all of her children!

God...she reminds me of my 86 year-old mother! (Maybe we should get the court's permission to lock her in a tower in France...?)



Nothing is what it seems. Everything is a test. Rule #1: Don't...get...caught.

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I understand a filmed play to mean actors actually performing in a theatre on a stage while a camera films their performance.

If that's the case, the version I saw with Liz and Dick was by no means a filmed play.

The movie "opened up" the stage play by introducing new locales instead of everything taking place on one set -- like the play does.

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I'm very sure ChrisWN^ meant "filmed play" as in a play (composed of 99% dialogue) being adapted to a movie in which a great deal of stories are visually told. Audiences nowadays aren't used to films being so heavily dialogue based.

Ignore the trolls! Any failure to do so will only grant them the satisfaction they seek!

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Also:

Long Day's Journey Into Night (fairly similar to WAOVW)
Wait Until Dark
The Bad Seed
Dial M For Murder
Plaza Suite (admittedly early 1970s)
12 Angry Men
Gaslight (the play was called "Angel Street")
The Little Foxes
You Can't Take it With You (one of the first of the filmed plays; made in 1938)
Harvey
The Heiress
Night Must Fall (another of the first; 1937)
A Streetcar Named Desire


Ignore the trolls! Any failure to do so will only grant them the satisfaction they seek!

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Please, please give this movie another chance!

There is no doubt that it is hard hitting and it is a valid question to wonder if something so horrific needs to be witnessed but, in terms of writing, directing and performances, it is top class.

I really think that Taylor glistens in this. To be honest, I was gobsmacked at how good she was. One could easily confuse Martha with the actress. She is SO good that you could forget that she is acting - a common mistake. Martha is awful, mouthy and tragic but that does not mean that the performance is. Look at some of Liz Taylor's monologues: the scene near the end where she describes her son - or her description to George Segal of the truth of her love for - and unwanted rescuing by - George (Burton). These are simply beautiful and wonderfully shaded. Watch some of the more subtle attacks she makes on Burton - deftly handled, perfectly placed and supremely vicious. When she lets fly, she is magnificent. On second viewing, there is a lot more subtlety there than at first seen. I find this to be one of the best female screen performances ever.

Watch Sandy Dennis closely for one viewing. Her little mouse with the big bad secret is perfectly honed. She is such a tribute to just-less-than-mediocrity - intellectually out of her depth in the company of the other three but forging on stupidly. 'Honey' never really gets what is going on and Dennis captures her position triumphantly.

If you look beyond the unpleasant content to the delivery, you can really discover something. It is by no means a constant shouting match. there are some very quiet scenes but real shows of tenderness are so rare (NOT absent!) that you leave it with the feeling that your heart has been ripped out and your eardrums burst.

The tenderness IS there. George and Martha are hopelessly and destuctively in love. This comes out, undeniably, at the end - which is actually a new beginning for them and, as such is - believe it or not - positive.

"Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf" turned theatre on its head. It was the first of it's kind - it's not so easy to see that now.

What's it all about? Is it really necessary? What does it prove? these are valid and important questions but for a separate discussion than the one on the craftsmanship of the writing, the performances, the music - which should have snatched the Oscar from 'Born free' - and the photography.

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DominicOFlynn^

Bravo!

Splendid analysis :)

I truly like this movie and I believe the heart of it does rest in the performances of all involved (and, in line with what the OP wrote, I am usually not a fan of Liz Taylor as an actress -- sorry, I just am not -- but I did find her performance in this movie remarkable).

The screaming/shouting throughout the film: I had to laugh when I read what other posters wrote about that because once I gave a copy of this movie to my sister. She had never seen it before, she knew nothing about it, including how dialog was delivered in it, and she decided to watch it late at night in bed while her husband was sleeping beside her. She had no idea about the 'volume' of some of the scenes. She starts watching the movie (TV and DVD are across the room from her) and everything is good UNTIL the screaming and shouting started and did not tone down. Fearing that this all would awaken her husband who had to get up early the next day for work, she frantically tried to find the remote control to mute the movie (she thought that if she got up out of bed to switch off the player or TV at that point, that that might also awaken her husband who is the type of guy who can’t get back to sleep once awakened), but to no avail. I could just see her in a panic as the shouting and shrillness of the dialogue continued, quickly and quietly patting her side of the bed down trying to find the remote, etc. She was none too happy with me the next day. After that little experience, I decided to buy her a pair of wireless headphones so that if I *surprised* her with another movie like that, she could watch in bed and listen via the headphones, without worrying about waking hubby :)

Anyway, you described beautifully some of what I feel this movie captures for me, but much more eloquently than I ever could.

Thanks for the wonderful post!


denise1234^




"I can't stand a naked light bulb, any more than..a rude remark or a vulgar action" Blanche DuBois

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Your sister had no business blaming you - doesn't she know that silent movies went out in the late twenties? Good story, tough!

I am hoping, though, to hear back from some of the others who might have given it another viewing.

Try Liz Taylor as 'Maggie the Cat' in 'Cat on a Hot Tin Roof'. Pretty good, I'd say. Apart from that, I really don't know. She's beautiful and demure in 'Father of the Bride' ...

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Hey there!

Well, I am not one of those 'other' posters, but just wanted to add that I DID see Liz Taylor in 'Cat On A Hot Tin Roof.' I love that movie. I have seen most, if not all, of Taylor's movies.

I don't know. She tried real hard and some of her performances WERE good (she usually also had great material to work with) but something just never 'clicked' with me so far as her acting, in general.



Take Care, denise1234 :)




"I can't stand a naked light bulb, any more than..a rude remark or a vulgar action" Blanche DuBois

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This is a wonderful drama about damaged people with brilliant dialogue and acting. There is a huge pile of recent films in the next room and I would swap 90% of them immediately for a copy of this.

You have to remember that this was groundbreaking in its day, and film-making has changed so much since the 60s. Dialogue seems to count for less and less, except maybe to set up the next action sequence.

Elizabeth Taylor was a revelation in this - I didn't really think she could act that much, but she does here. And she understood her character, put on weight to look older and more blowsy because Martha was a middle-aged woman who had squandered most of her life's potential and she knew it.

To be clear, this is a cinematic version of a play. A great play, and great theatre is not meant to be comfortable.

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Please, please give this movie another chance!


Why is it so important to you that someone else share YOUR opinion of this movie?

Why don't you think the original poster is entitled to their opinion?

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I can't say I liked the movie all that much but there's no question there was some deep stuff in it (it'd probably be better on second viewing when you notice a lot more of the hidden subtext), and the acting was superb. It was a great performance, and there is a time and place for movies that are raw performances in awkward sitautions. I completely disagree about Liz Taylor's acting, it was fantastic. Her talent was wasted in the Techicolor Hollywood Code years.

The one thing is I think the movie did wrong was to waste its suspension of disbelief when they went to the bar to dance. I could believe the younger couple would be shamed into staying all night, but not that they'd go back after having left. (Not sure why play movies feel the need to change the setting and mix up the lines: the movie already benefits enough from the camera and close-ups, especially a movie chock-full of emotion like this one.)

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I could believe the younger couple would be shamed into staying all night, but not that they'd go back after having left.


You could also ask the question why the younger couple went to Martha and George's house in the first place. After all, it was already the wee hours of Sunday morning. The fact is, they were caught in Martha and George's web: two little flies who flew too close to the spiders. That's why they got back in the car with Martha and returned to her house.

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If you were middle-aged and had actually spent a few drunken after-parties with dysfunctional hosts (including at least one where you ended up humping the hostess), you'd probably like this movie a lot more. Its dialogue and relationships ring uncomfortably true. It isn't pleasant to admit, but I've been there.

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To the OP, I think you're absolutely correct that the 60s era was a transition period in films/plays.

I think because of that, this play and this film version were masterpieces of the time. It represents that transition -- aging George and Martha - college president's daughter, too many cocktails, shattered dreams. And the new upstarts -- Nick and Honey, who also revealed problems. But Nick and Honey had the future and hope. George and Martha were only going to "climb them well-worn stairs" at the end.

George and Martha were of the generation that fought in WWII and learned about Nazi atrocities in their 20s. After the war, everyone had a job, and anyone could buy a house for under $20k. They had a baby boom (of which I am part). They had fun with breaking old rules that their parents didn't -- people of the early 20th and late 19th centuries who didn't even have electricity.

By the 1960s, George and Martha found themselves aging and childless. In those days, being 40 and never having children was a big deal. There are some interpretations of the play that bring in homosexuality, since Edward Albee was gay.

This film was not long after the great psychological dramas and Method Acting of the 50s, but only a few years before the 1969 Summer of Love and Stonewall and subsequent films of the 70s. Absolutely, it was a transition. Edward Albee was Tennessee Williams v.2.

I was pretty young when I first saw a clip of this film on Merv Griffin, or some show where Elizabeth Taylor was a guest. It was the parking lot scene. My mom ran in from the next room, and said, "What are you watching?!" She turned it off, but I resolved to see the movie. I've since watched it countless times.

To those who are seeing it for the first time, just watch it. Don't try to relate yourself to it. These were different times and different people. You don't have to like the people in the movie to see the world through their eyes for a moment.

One thing I'd like to say about Elizabeth Taylor: In this film, she had a soliloquy, as she had in many films, and I think she excelled at that. Whether "Raintree County" or "Suddenly Last Summer," take note of her moments when the action stops and she tells a story. Spellbinding!

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They were 2 very wounded souls just trying to get thru life. Blame strangers, blame each other, blame anyone vs face the truth. Drowning themselves in booze to forget the pain.

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I didn't like the movie either. Yes it was a surprise that they never even had a son, but what was all the relentless arguing and abuse about?

Anyway, Liz Taylor is so over rated. I never got why anyone thought she was a good actress. She might have been good as a child, but her transition to adult films was histrionic.

Another actress who had this same problem was Natalie Wood altho she may have been able to tone it down into her mature years had she lived.

Not that great a movie. You see, things that seemed so novel and great as plays or as movies 30-40- years ago, do not always stand the test of time.

Our preferences change so much and the way movies are made changes.
This movie deserved 4 stars in 1966, but in 2011 NO!

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It's about disappointment, self loathing and just plain sadness which brings out the worse in all of us, not even including the alcohol. Martha, who was an only child, got no attention from her father, with whom she could never measure up to. So, she married someone who was supposed to score in her father's eyes. He had everything she thought he would want. But, alas, the husband was too weak to stand up to father's demanding standards, as smart as George was. So, Martha hates him for not being what she thought he could be and George hates himself for failing Martha (and her father) and hates Martha for reminding him of it each day. That kind of pain and torture must be excruciating. That's the way academics are, they pick everything to death. Oh, and then here comes George's successor, that must have been very hard to swallow. All the other cruelties, like the non existent child, etc is just more icing for the cake. Do you understand it better now. Life can be very difficult when he put all our eggs in one basket and all our money on one horse.

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One of the mistakes in watching a movie or a play like WA0VW is to expect it to be about a single, specific thing that can be reduced to a simple aphorism, like most movies: "Love conquers all," "Crime doesn't pay," that sort of thing. WAOVW works on many levels and has many themes that intersect. The framework here is that George and Martha have made their marriage -- strange as looks to outsiders -- work thanks to the invention of an imaginary child. They are like millions of other people who put on a front to make themselves feel better about their lives. By the end of the story, George and Martha have "exorcised" the child and agreed to persevere in their relationship without the benefit of a comforting illusion -- in other words, to accept their disappointments. I don't find the story depressing at all. In fact, just the opposite, because underneath all the venom and the booze are two people who love and care about each other deeply. I don't know if that's the academic interpretation, but it's how I see it. And any truly great work of art should be open to various interpretations.

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Good interpretation. Well said.

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